All posts filed under: Pop Culture

Originally posted on The Collective: ? The doomsday clock is ticking. The end of the world is coming. Typical Doctor Who, am I right? **Spoilers ahead, Sweetie.** A Brief Overview of What Happened After the last episode were everything was a simulation and therefore didn’t really happen, we are back in the real world (or so we are led to believe so far). And the monks are here. Hiding out in a 5,000-year-old pyramid that has only just recently showed up. So, naturally, it immediately draws the attention of the United Nations, who then call on their President of the Earth, AKA the Doctor to help. But this isn’t your typical invasion, oh no. The monks have set every clock in the world to be the doomsday clock, counting down to the end of the world. But it’s not a threat, they’re not the ones that are going to end the world. It’s simply a warning that the world is going to end by the human’s own hands. After creating simulations of the world for…

Originally posted on Jordan and Eddie (The Movie Guys): Title – The Jungle Book (2016) Director – Jon Favreau (Chef) Cast – Neel Sethi, (Voices of) Bill Murray, Idris Elba, Sir Ben Kingsley, Lupita Nyong’o, Christopher Walken, Giancarlo Esposito, Scarlett Johansson, Garry Shandling Plot – Orphaned as a young boy, Mowgli (Sethi) is raised in the jungle after being rescued by kindly jaguar Bagheera (Kingsley) and given to the care of a wolf pack led by Akela (Esposito) and Raksha (Nyong’o). As he grows older however his life is threatened by vicious tiger Shere Khan (Elba) and Mowgli finds himself banished from the wolf pack and in partnership with honey loving bear Baloo (Murray). “No matter where you go or what they may call you, you will always be my son” Review by Eddie on 12/04/2016 While it’s never going to be regarded in the same fashion as it’s beloved animated namesake from 1967, or the very book it’s based upon in the form of Rudyard Kipling’s revered novel, Iron Man director Jon Favreau’s well-meaning…

Originally posted on Read at Midnight: I haven’t updated the blog in over a week, but I promise I have a good reason for it! I spent the last week in New Zealand visiting friends and family. While I was there, I finally got to visit the Hobbiton set in Matamata. My partner and I are huge fans of the Lord of the Rings movie (we have rewatched the trilogy every year since we started dating), so it was a delight to visit The Shire. Our tour guide told us that March is one of the best time to visit – as the various flowers and foliage are in still vibrant, yet you miss the summer holiday crowd. We booked our tour the day before via the official website. The cost of these tours are $79NZD per adult (as of March 2016). As far as we could tell, the only way to gain access to the site is via these official tours, as you cannot drive directly there. We chose to drive into Matamata (around 2.5 hours from…

When I got to work on Monday, the first thing a coworker asked me was, “How did the game treat you last night?” I almost responded, “Really well! After we killed the mind controlling plant, we finally had enough XP to level up! I can’t wait–I’ve got my eye on some new spells for my elf.” And then I realized she wasn’t asking how my bimonthly Dungeons and Dragons game went. She was talking about that football game. By the time I got words out of my mouth, I replied, “Oh, I don’t football.” As a matter of fact, I don’t even know who played in the Super Bowl this year. I certainly can’t tell you who won. I really should be a football fan. I grew up with parents who watched the Cowboys like a religion. I know many of the rules and can follow a game easily. My fiance played football in high school, although that was long before I knew him. I drive regularly on Tom Landry Freeway, passing a giant picture …

Originally posted on The Nostalgia Blog: Toronto will apparently become the latest city (joining NYC, Sydney, Beijing and Liverpool) to have their very own Central Perk Cafe. The cafe opens in June and will supposedly give out prizes to customers who come in dressed as FRIENDS characters…so I guess people with gel in their hair and wearing t-shirts tucked into khaki pants. The attention to detail will supposedly be uncanny so this should be a big draw for die-hard FRIENDS fans. I just finally hope it answers the question of how 6 more or less fully employed people can spend 60% of their lives in a cafe and still afford to live in New York…Also I hope the barista has bleach blonde hair.

Originally posted on Jordan and Eddie (The Movie Guys): Will Batman vs Superman live up to the hype? Accounting for both cinema and home audiences, 2016 appears to have a strong line up of blockbuster and awards fair, as well as independent and genre offerings worth getting excited for. Cultured viewers will appreciate franchises such as Underworld returning, hopefully as immaculately constructed as ever, and I’m predicting some quality to be found in an adaptation of one of 2015’s most popular novels. Please note also that these films are included based on their Australian release dates, and some may have already been released in other territories. Of course sometimes the very best films are the ones that come out of nowhere and don’t feature on these types of lists, but I hope you can agree and see reason to be excited about the below 10 titles! For Eddie’s list of most anticipated films click here. Plot summaries from IMDb 10. Cold Moon Directed by: Griff Furst Starring: Robbie Kay, Christopher Lloyd, Candy Clark Christopher Lloyd as James Redfield…

Originally posted on Cookies + Sangria: Welcome back to Hamilton Explained! It’s been a minute. When the Hamilton soundtrack was released all of these historical and musical references were jumping out at me and I wanted to start unpacking some of them here. I wasn’t counting on a whole community of people doing this very thing over at Genius. Instead of duplicating the efforts from Genius (check out their annotations if you haven’t!) here’s Cabinet Battle #1, explained through tweets from Kanye West’s epic January 27, 2016 against Wiz Khalifa. WASHINGTON: Ladies and gentlemen, you coulda been anywhere in the world tonight, but you’re here with us in New York City. Are you ready for a cabinet meeting??? The issue on the table: Secretary Hamilton’s plan to assume state debt and establish a national bank. Secretary Jefferson, you have the floor, sir JEFFERSON: ‘Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.’ We fought for these ideals; we shouldn’t settle for less These are wise words, enterprising men quote ‘em Don’t act surprised, you guys, cuz I wrote ‘em 8th I…

Originally posted on Rachael Reads: RATING: 5/5 SYNOPSIS: The tales of Finn, Rey, and Poe in the days prior to the start of The Force Awakens. ? This book does a great job in helping to cement the things that you already thought about the characters after seeing the film and it also provides a nice backstory for Poe Dameron since we don’t see as much of him as we do Finn and Rey. In Finn’s story we get to see Stormtrooper training and really get into that whole hive mentality that keeps them all in check. I really enjoyed learning just a little bit more about the Stormtrooper teams and how they worked and I liked seeing them interact with each other outside of battle. I especially liked that we got to see some more of Captain Phasma and General Hux. I felt like I knew Phasma a little better after reading the section and I’m also more interested in Hux as a character. The relationship between Phasma and Finn was really interesting and I hope…

Originally posted on Jordan and Eddie (The Movie Guys): Title: Room (2015) Director: Lenny Abrahamson (Frank) Cast: Brie Larson, Jacob Tremblay, William H. Macy, Joan Allen, Sean Bridgers Plot: 5 year old Jack (Tremblay) and his loving mother (Larson) are held captive in a small room that they’ve been imprisoned in by Old Nick (Bridgers). As Jack begins to understand more about the world and why they are held captive, the two begin to plot their escape into the great big world that lay outside their walls. “When I was small, I only knew small things. But now I’m five, I know everything!” Review by Eddie on 18/01/2016 It says a lot about the quiet yet assured power of Room that despite the fact half of Lenny Abrahamson’s film takes place in the titular and small “room” or really prison that Brie Larsons Ma and her son Jack played by impressive newcomer Jacob Tremblay are kept in, scenes in the film constantly engage the viewer through terrific performances, a taught and sharp script by Emma Donaghue (who here adapts her own book)…